Re: Different speeds for different technologies

I already have 3 speeds right now do the same thing for determining whether or not customers can qualify for the faster speeds depending on the same variables.

What I'm trying to do is move to two different sets of speed tiers depending on whether they are 2.4/5ghz or 900mhz. About 50% of my customers are 900mhz, so I don't want to just avoid advertising the slower speeds they can get, but at the same time, I don't want to confuse people who are able to get the faster speeds but might not understand the difference between the two.

Does that make sense?

If not, let me be a bit more detailed....

Right now I offer:

768k @ $40/mo1 meg @ $60/mo1.5 megs @ $80/mo

Those are the only plans I've offered up until today. I plan on keeping 900mhz customers on those speeds, but I want to move the customers who are on 2.4ghz or 5ghz to the following speeds:

1 meg @ $40/mo2 megs @ $60/mo3 megs @ $80/mo

It was easy to advertise 3 speeds and turn someone away from the faster speeds if they didn't have the signal or if the tower didn't have enough capacity. The hard part is now having two sets of speed tiers, and helping customers understand which one they can get without being too confusing.

This is an interesting question. I saw the website of one WISP that wouldn't show the plans and prices until you had entered your location.

The website appeared to have a robust back-end and was well implemented. It allowed the WISP to tailor packages for a variety of conditions.

It seemed reasonable, and smart, to implement this system as it was capable of fine tuning pricing to accurately reflect the cost of providing service to a particular area.

The downside was dealing with customer perception. I am sure that it annoyed customers that they couldn't check rates without going to some extra effort. It wasn't that hard to pretend that you were in a different area to compare rates.

The explanation for the variation in rates was kept fairly simple and generic. It wasn't too hard to imagine that rates could also be adjusted for areas based on competition/lack of competition.

Some negative feedback was probably received as the website now shows a set of generic rates with instructions to enter your location for more specific details. I would assume that the rate variation would not be as large as it once could have been, but I am unwilling to spend the time to check a number of areas.

Perhaps this will give you some ideas. I suspect that the hardest part will be providing a clearly explained set of reasons why these differences exist which the customer will buy into instead of viewing it as discrimination.

I think you are have some trouble with that for sure, customers will be confused. I cant even comment well because my market would never bear those prices

Id figure out a way to bring everything in line, instead of 2 tiers of pricing plans, You are gonna get calls from 900mhz customers (who often dont know or care how the internet gets to their house) why they cant get 3 meg for the same price they are paying for 1.5 meg. Or they wont understand why you cant change their antenna, etc.

I saw the website of one WISP that wouldn't show the plans and prices until you had entered your location.

Yeah, I've seen similar implementations (Centurylink, for example) and it would be very hard to put something together that would be close to accurate. I have plenty of areas where I'll have a 2.4 ghz install, 2 houses down is a 900 mhz, and the next house is 2.4 again. Many times I don't know for sure until I'm standing on the roof seeing what the signals are and which exact trees are in the way.

I suspect that the hardest part will be providing a clearly explained set of reasons why these differences exist which the customer will buy into instead of viewing it as discrimination.

Yes, that is part of the issue. When I first started and had no real income to speak of, I charged different equipment prices depending on what it took to get customers service. If they were on 2.4 ghz, it was usually between $100 and $150. If it was 900mhz the price was usually between $250 and $300. People didn't really mind the prices too much, as long as they were told the correct ones up front so they could make a decision. It was a really tough sell saying that it would cost somewhere between $100 and $300 for equipment. I could explain the difference and they understood. If I said the price was $300, they were thrilled if it turned out to be less, but I know a lot of people walked away from my service without giving it a shot, even though it might have ended up being less. On the other hand, if I said I thought it would be $100 and it was actually $300, well, they were usually less than impressed and many walked away from the service with a bad impression.

The biggest thing when advertising my speeds that I want to avoid is setting the wrong expectation... If someone is expecting the faster speeds, they may be mad if they can't get them. On the other hand, many may not even try if they think they will be stuck on the slower speeds.

Id figure out a way to bring everything in line, instead of 2 tiers of pricing plans

That has been my goal for the last 5 years. I've kept things very simple and only had one set of speeds regardless of technology. Occasionally I've had to deny someone the faster plans because the capacity wasn't there, but at least the base speeds were the same. Ever since I was able to subsidize part of the equipment, I've picked a price right in the middle. I make a little money on the installation for some, lose money on the installation for others, but it was one price and easy to market.

I know you mentioned that your market wouldn't even consider my plans, but that's part of my problem too. With my bandwidth costs starting to drop, the "upgraded" speeds are probably only an incremental stepping stone and I'll most likely be bumping them up again within a year or less. I just don't want to make any moves too big before my network and backhaul is ready for it.

I'm starting to have a really hard time being competitive by limiting myself to only what my 900mhz network can handle. I need to offer faster speeds, but the 900mhz network simply can't handle much more load than it already has. I'm already having issues, and don't have much room to grow on 900mhz. I don't want to invest in or expand my 900mhz network anymore because it just isn't worth it, but as a 900mhz customer leaves, that opens the door for a new one, so I don't want to abandon it either.

So basically this is a matter of making myself competitive where I can be competitive. The faster speeds are a lot more competitive in town where I can service with 2.4 and 5.8. Even the old slower speeds are fairly decent in many of the markets where I only have 900mhz service. So I'm really selling two products to two different customer bases, but all under the same company, and the only difference in the product is the speeds.